In a range of industrial applications power is conveyed between relatively rotating components via slip rings, such as to supply power to the nacelle of a wind turbine. It is common for multiple slip rings to be employed to provide sufficient current handling capacity due to the power handling limitations of a single slip ring. However, conventional slip rings require high levels of maintenance and are prone to failure.
Contactless near field inductively coupled power transfer systems typically employ a single pair of transmission and reception coils to avoid the loose coupling and negative interaction associated with multiple pairs of transmission and reception coils. Typically a single pair of coils is employed sized to transfer the required power. Where redundancy has been required this has been achieved through the provision of an alternate non-inductively coupled link such as via brush type slip rings.
It would be desirable to provide an efficient and reliable power transfer system for transferring power between spaced apart components providing redundancy in fault conditions or to at least provide the public with a useful choice.